Latest / The Right Time with Bomani Jones / Tom Haberstroh on Anthony Edwards has NO FEAR of Wemby, Jaylen Brown Drama & the Jokic Analytics Debate | 05.06

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Tom Haberstroh on Anthony Edwards has NO FEAR of Wemby, Jaylen Brown Drama & the Jokic Analytics Debate | 05.06 · The Right Time with Bomani Jones

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Wave.
• 0:09
  Speaker 2: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the right time. A wave original.
• 0:13
  Speaker 2: My name is Bobani Jones. Thanks for listening wherever you
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  Speaker 2: have a guest join us. Check him out at Yahoo Sports.
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  Speaker 2: Check out his excellent newsletter, Tom the Finder. Check him
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  Speaker 2: out with the Portland Trailblazers, pre and post.
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: Tom Haverstraw, what's going on, man?
• 0:36
  Speaker 3: What's happening, Bomani?
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: Hey, man, it's all good. Shout out to every listener.
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: Every time we do this, we have one listener. who
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: finds out that Tom Haberstroh is white. There's always one
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: that learns this. It is a fascinating thing to me
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: that they did not know this already. It's kind of
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: like it's a lot of white people that think that
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: Jason Kidd is one of their own.
• 0:55
  Speaker 3: Hey, man, if they want to call me Tyrone Haberstroh,
• 1:00
  Speaker 3: that was what my name was a few weeks ago.
• 1:02
  Speaker 3: I'm okay with that, but it is Tom. I would
• 1:04
  Speaker 3: just say it is Tom.
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: Hey, look, I'm just telling you, man. Tom ain't no Tom,
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: but I hung out with Tom at a wedding in
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: Gardena last.
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  Speaker 1: Summer, man. He fit. He was crew. He was well
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: under control. You know what I'm saying? But look, NBA playoffs,
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: we're here.
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  Speaker 2: We're going to have Wednesday night, San Antonio- Minnesota, Monday night.
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  Speaker 1: Look, it's only one game. The series has to go.
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  Speaker 2: But I've been calling Anthony Edwards the legend killer because
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: he just comes.
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  Speaker 1: And he has taken out all his heroes.
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  Speaker 2: Like you can look one by one, year after year
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  Speaker 2: after year, the Timberwolves are taking out some hero of
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  Speaker 2: Anthony Edwards. And now the legend killer is going at
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  Speaker 2: the legend before the legend even got there. He's not
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: even supposed to be playing because he's got this bone bruise, right?
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  Speaker 2: They win this game against San Antonio. And I think
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  Speaker 2: the most impressive thing How many shots did Victor block?
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: 13? 12.
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  Speaker 3: But according to Chris Finch, it was three. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
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  Speaker 1: He eliminated all of those.
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  Speaker 2: But I want to say they had something like 40,
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  Speaker 2: 50 points in the paint. They were completely unafraid of
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  Speaker 2: continuing to go in the paint, even though Victor was
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: pitching a shit all over the place. And they got
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: another one of these wins where for me, I know
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: that people get locked into the numbers. Anthony Edwards seems
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: to be the leader guy in the NBA.
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  Speaker 3: So the thing about Anthony Edwards is he not only
• 2:27
  Speaker 3: talks the talk, but he walks the walk. And I
• 2:28
  Speaker 3: love this about Anthony Edwards because he is the perfect
• 2:31
  Speaker 3: character in the NBA media to put him on a
• 2:36
  Speaker 3: pedestal and broadcast him to the masses. The energy that
• 2:41
  Speaker 3: he brings, he came off the bench in this one,
• 2:43
  Speaker 3: coming back from injury, is the exact kind of storyline
• 2:46
  Speaker 3: that David Stern would be doing backflips for. Is Anthony
• 2:49
  Speaker 3: Edwards coming for every one of his, whether it's Kevin Durant,
• 2:54
  Speaker 3: or whether it's every star player that you need a
• 2:58
  Speaker 3: rival for, and a guy who's good looking, can talk,
• 3:03
  Speaker 3: and can absolutely play and back it up, where he's
• 3:06
  Speaker 3: got maybe five of the top 10 dunks that we've
• 3:08
  Speaker 3: had in the last five, 10 years, It's Anthony Edwards
• 3:11
  Speaker 3: just bodying people. So he has that it factor. And
• 3:15
  Speaker 3: then going against, you know, you and I are both huge,
• 3:18
  Speaker 3: huge believers in Victor Wembenyama and that feeling like this
• 3:23
  Speaker 3: league is about to be taken over if it hasn't
• 3:25
  Speaker 3: happened already by that guy, Victor Wembenyama. And Anthony Edwards
• 3:31
  Speaker 3: came back early and I was just, man, shivers went
• 3:34
  Speaker 3: down my spine for the Spurs because Anthony Edwards just, man.
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  Speaker 3: He's about this life in the NBA. He's about it.
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  Speaker 3: And when you go at Wemby and then you have
• 3:45
  Speaker 3: Julius Randle doing the more, uh, Marcin Gortat screen and
• 3:50
  Speaker 3: being physical and taking them out like a, like a snowplow,
• 3:54
  Speaker 3: taking them out of the paint. We're having to see
• 3:57
  Speaker 3: Victor Wemby Yama respond in ways that, that I feel
• 4:00
  Speaker 3: like playoff experience is overrated and more so overrated in
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  Speaker 3: this era because injuries are way more important in today's
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  Speaker 3: era and three-pointers and the variance is way more important
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  Speaker 3: than quote-unquote experience. But Victor Wimbonyama has got to respond
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  Speaker 3: in a big way because there's a lot of juice
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  Speaker 3: in this series and Anthony Edwards is here for it.
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  Speaker 2: Well, I think something else interesting about Edwards, and I'm
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: curious what you think about this. He is not a
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  Speaker 2: high achiever in your advanced metrics, right?
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: Like you could go through the numbers that it makes.
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  Speaker 2: He's the sort of guy that we've looked back in
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  Speaker 2: the past. Kobe Bryant is somewhat of an example there
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  Speaker 2: where his reputation is not quite matched by some of
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  Speaker 2: the advanced numbers behind him. But every now and then,
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  Speaker 2: you just need to go out here and win a game.
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: And there are some things that I think are not
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: necessarily quantifiable. And Edwards seems to be the modern case
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  Speaker 2: of that one. Because one could try to make the
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  Speaker 2: argument about him that he's more in the class of
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: calling it Carmelo Anthony, right? Who we all think was
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  Speaker 2: an excellent basketball player. But it was fair to raise
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  Speaker 2: the questions about how much he affected winning.
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  Speaker 1: Anthony Edwards clearly.
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  Speaker 2: affects winning because i don't know who these motherfuckers are
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  Speaker 2: on the team with him half the time and you'll look.
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  Speaker 1: Up at one of them scoring 45 points.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah i would assume who uh was just basically like
• 5:13
  Speaker 3: handed to them by the chicago bulls uh and kobe
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  Speaker 3: white who like saved the charlotte hornets in that play-in
• 5:19
  Speaker 3: game also just handed to the charlotte hornets in ways
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  Speaker 3: that wait a carolina guy's falling from the skies you
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  Speaker 3: can actually play and be the second creator on a
• 5:28
  Speaker 3: playoff team The Bulls, just call up the Bulls and
• 5:31
  Speaker 3: be like, yo, can we get Alex Caruso? Great, we'll
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  Speaker 3: take him. Io DeSumo, great. 43 points, scored more points
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  Speaker 3: in that series than anyone on the Denver Nuggets. Great,
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  Speaker 3: we'll take him. And look, Anthony Edwards coming back in
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  Speaker 3: this series. He was coming off the bench. He only
• 5:47
  Speaker 3: played 25 minutes. But you know that that's going to
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  Speaker 3: be closer to 35 here in game two. And Victor
• 5:53
  Speaker 3: Wembyama is already here saying, I got to figure out
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  Speaker 3: my energy. I got to figure out my minutes. Like
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  Speaker 3: I came out dedicating way more energy to the defensive
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  Speaker 3: side of the floor. And it's ironic that he plays
• 6:05
  Speaker 3: for the San Antonio Spurs because a lot of these
• 6:07
  Speaker 3: blocks that I saw him making in that game one,
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  Speaker 3: I would say, can you be a little bit more
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  Speaker 3: like Tim Duncan? Can you just block it a little
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  Speaker 3: bit and get it back and then start the break
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  Speaker 3: the other way? You don't need to slap it across
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  Speaker 3: the backboard or slap it out of bounds. Just get that, that,
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  Speaker 3: little block steal as I like to call it. A
• 6:25
  Speaker 3: lot of times players would swat it into the third
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  Speaker 3: row and feel like they did something and then they
• 6:32
  Speaker 3: inbound it and then they score a layup and it's like, hey,
• 6:34
  Speaker 3: he gets a block for that, but did he get
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  Speaker 3: a stop?
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  Speaker 1: No.
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  Speaker 3: And sometimes I do wish that Victor Wemunyama would just
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  Speaker 3: look for the stop rather than the block.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think, and I also wonder to a degree
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  Speaker 2: whether somebody there has given him like the John Thompson
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  Speaker 2: lecture to Patrick Ewing, just to go out here and
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  Speaker 2: beat the shit out the ball And because they'll remember
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  Speaker 2: it and then go from there.
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  Speaker 1: Right.
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  Speaker 2: Like there is the block it out of bounds is
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  Speaker 2: a bit of a waste. But in theory, it'll get
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  Speaker 2: into their heads. And Minnesota was like, no, bro, not
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  Speaker 2: going to. It's not going to do that at all, actually,
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  Speaker 2: to us. But I also think for San Antonio, they've
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  Speaker 2: never played a game with these stakes. And say what
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  Speaker 2: you want about Minnesota. It's not the whole roster, but
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: the guy in charge, he and Gobert, Julius Randle, Nas Reed,
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  Speaker 2: these are guys who have played games at this level.
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: The Spurs basically have Harrison Barnes. Nobody else has been
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: in a game like this. And it's interesting how these
• 7:31
  Speaker 2: different levels of being in the playoffs or whatever, different
• 7:34
  Speaker 2: levels of stakes, truly add to the pressure in a
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  Speaker 2: different way. Like I was thinking about the time I
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: went to the Carolina Duke game at Cameron. I have
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: been to Cameron for other games. You just notice how
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: much hotter it is when it's the Carolina game, right?
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: Like physically hotter.
• 7:49
  Speaker 2: Part of that may be some decisions from, you know,
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: the thermodynamic department, but also.
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  Speaker 1: Wait, wait, wait, wait.
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  Speaker 3: Are you alleging Greg Popovich didn't have something to do
• 8:02
  Speaker 3: with the LeBron cramp game in the finals?
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  Speaker 2: I am simply saying that at times things can be different.
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  Speaker 2: But what I am saying in this case... It's just
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  Speaker 2: more pressure. It's just a different energy. And so when
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: Victor talks about, hey, I got to figure out how
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  Speaker 2: to regulate my energy, that's a man who misunderstood how
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  Speaker 2: this was going to feel once he.
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: Got out there.
• 8:24
  Speaker 3: Yeah, but I also feel like he updates his iOS
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  Speaker 3: system better than anybody.
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: Yes, he does.
• 8:29
  Speaker 3: He's learning so fast. And you know that he's a
• 8:32
  Speaker 3: dude who, when he goes out there in his age
• 8:35
  Speaker 3: 20 season, and leads a team to a 60-win. And
• 8:40
  Speaker 3: it wasn't all him. He missed a bunch of games
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  Speaker 3: this season, and they played well without him with De'Aaron
• 8:45
  Speaker 3: Fox and Stephon Castle, Devin Vassell, and Dylan Harper, the rookie.
• 8:50
  Speaker 3: But I feel like Victor Wembanyama thinks about the game
• 8:54
  Speaker 3: in ways that are well beyond his years. And I
• 8:57
  Speaker 3: feel like this is a huge, a massive game, too,
• 9:00
  Speaker 3: for him because a down 0-2 hole going back to Minnesota–
• 9:05
  Speaker 3: with a team that's already been to the Western Conference
• 9:07
  Speaker 3: Finals twice, and every day that they play is another
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  Speaker 3: day that you're going to see five more minutes out
• 9:14
  Speaker 3: of Anthony Edwards, they can't play with their food too
• 9:16
  Speaker 3: much here, Bomani. And the offensive balance for Victor Wembenyama...
• 9:23
  Speaker 3: He missed all of his three-pointers. De'Aaron Fox also did, too,
• 9:26
  Speaker 3: in some of that shot variance. If that shot goes
• 9:28
  Speaker 3: in from Champagny, a wide-open three at the last second,
• 9:32
  Speaker 3: if that goes in, this is a totally different narrative
• 9:34
  Speaker 3: going into game two. But I do think that Victor
• 9:37
  Speaker 3: Wembenyama needs to expend more of his energy offensively, getting
• 9:40
  Speaker 3: down in the paint, get that vertical spacing, and play
• 9:43
  Speaker 3: more of a bully. But as we saw what Rudy
• 9:46
  Speaker 3: Gobert did to Nikola Jokic and Julius Randle is a bull.
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: He is insane.
• 9:52
  Speaker 3: He is strong as it comes when you talk about
• 9:55
  Speaker 3: big men who want to go through you uh and
• 9:57
  Speaker 3: are willing to be physical Julius Randall is a different
• 10:01
  Speaker 3: guy than say most of the fours in today's NBA.
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: Also Rudy Rudy this is round two of and I
• 10:09
  Speaker 2: took that personally if Rudy Gobert was ever going to
• 10:12
  Speaker 2: take anything personally right Jokic who has dominated him For
• 10:15
  Speaker 2: basically a decade, he decided he wasn't having it.
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: This go around. Victor, who, I mean, Victor's reputation was made, right?
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: When there's some interaction with him and Rudy where he
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: destroys him, and I keep talking all the time about
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: two years ago when Victor said, congratulations, but win a
• 10:30
  Speaker 2: defensive player of the year, you'll never win it again.
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: Just throwing it out there.
• 10:34
  Speaker 2: I can't imagine how insufferable Victor was to the French
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: basketball people when he was like 17, right? Like that
• 10:42
  Speaker 2: actual asshole age. And now you're coming in and you're like,
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: I'm better than.
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: All of them. And they're like, yeah, we're going to see.
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: And then you are.
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: Yep.
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: Yep.
• 10:52
  Speaker 3: And that's, and that's the story of Victor Wembanyama. And
• 10:54
  Speaker 3: this was when we were talking about this season was,
• 10:57
  Speaker 3: can he ramp up and be that guy in the playoffs?
• 11:00
  Speaker 3: If he's playing like 27 minutes, like he did in
• 11:02
  Speaker 3: the regular season. And now you're seeing the fatigue factor
• 11:06
  Speaker 3: is impacting him in ways that I, I'm hoping just
• 11:11
  Speaker 3: for the drama that we get Victor Weminyama against Chet
• 11:15
  Speaker 3: Holmgren and Shea Gildress Alexander in the Western Conference Finals.
• 11:18
  Speaker 3: I feel like that is so necessary for people to
• 11:21
  Speaker 3: buy into Wemby is him having these moments in the
• 11:25
  Speaker 3: playoffs where he overcomes. I remember it was his rookie season,
• 11:29
  Speaker 3: I want to say. I told all my friends and
• 11:32
  Speaker 3: their kids to watch Victor Weminyama's debut on national TV,
• 11:36
  Speaker 3: and he did a clunker. He had a stinker on
• 11:39
  Speaker 3: national TV in his debut, and I felt like he
• 11:42
  Speaker 3: needs to have these moments, and he did it at
• 11:45
  Speaker 3: Madison Square Garden against the Knicks on Christmas Day. He
• 11:48
  Speaker 3: needs to have this in game two where it's just like, oh,
• 11:52
  Speaker 3: he's already here. And what he did against the Portland
• 11:55
  Speaker 3: Trailblazers in the first round, that's great, but against Anthony
• 11:57
  Speaker 3: Edwards and Rudy Gobert and Julius Randle here in the
• 11:59
  Speaker 3: second round would do wonders because 11 points is not
• 12:03
  Speaker 3: going to cut.
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: I get it.
• 12:03
  Speaker 3: He had a triple-double with blocks. But we see Chris
• 12:06
  Speaker 3: Finch out here playing the whole officials and the media
• 12:09
  Speaker 3: game in between. Frank Vogel used to do this with LeBron,
• 12:12
  Speaker 3: that he gets officiated differently than everybody else. And they're
• 12:16
  Speaker 3: trying to play the referees in the press conferences. I
• 12:20
  Speaker 3: don't know if that will work, but Victor Wembanyama has
• 12:23
  Speaker 3: to be better than just getting five baskets inside the
• 12:27
  Speaker 3: three-point arc as he had in game one.
• 12:29
  Speaker 2: Well, that was the mistake there is, hey, man, you
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: don't have to keep shooting all those shots from out there.
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: You're eight feet tall.
• 12:38
  Speaker 2: We have other people who can do that, but you're
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: the only guy we've got that can be eight feet tall.
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: So, like, you know, if you want to go do
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: the eight feet tall things, yeah, it's cool. I understand.
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: You're a renaissance man. That's fine.
• 12:48
  Speaker 2: Go down there and be eight feet tall, and that'll
• 12:51
  Speaker 2: probably be better for the rest of us. For those
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: who don't know, with Chris Finch, he did off-day availability
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: with the media, and he talked about how, what was it,
• 12:59
  Speaker 2: he said four of Wendell Banyama's block's were goaltends and
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: he had a fairly decent case on them i just
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: want to point out that if we take away the
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: four that were goaltends there are still eight.
• 13:11
  Speaker 3: Left yeah and i went back and watched those i
• 13:15
  Speaker 3: think one is a legit goaltend and then the other
• 13:18
  Speaker 3: ones are iffy that it's still incredible to me bomani
• 13:22
  Speaker 3: that we've got all this technology in the world but
• 13:24
  Speaker 3: we can't figure out goaltends It's a literal, just the
• 13:28
  Speaker 3: ball is on its way down and we have VAR
• 13:31
  Speaker 3: in soccer, but we can't figure out if the ball
• 13:33
  Speaker 3: flight is decreasing. How is this possible in the, in 2026,
• 13:39
  Speaker 3: we are still doing goaltends by just three dudes watching
• 13:43
  Speaker 3: the ball flight.
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: I'm okay with that.
• 13:45
  Speaker 3: I'm okay with that.
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: I'm okay with it.
• 13:46
  Speaker 3: We should have the tennis VAR where if it's on
• 13:50
  Speaker 3: the line or if it's not on the line, we've
• 13:51
  Speaker 3: had that for a decade now, it feels like. Why
• 13:54
  Speaker 3: can't we have this with ball flight? I don't understand
• 13:57
  Speaker 3: why we're still doing this like we're cavemen.
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: I do think the Cyclops is a good tool, right?
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: That's the tennis technology. I am with that.
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: I just feel like, to a degree, what you're talking
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: about is us making ourselves slaves to these robots.
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying? Like, it's- I'm not saying everything.
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: I know, but it's- I'm not saying everything. I'm saying goaltend.
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: That's how it starts. You know what I'm saying? Like, that's, that's,
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: I understand you. I feel you.
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: And goaltend is the tricky one because it's the, you know,
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: the idea of the ball is on its way down
• 14:28
  Speaker 2: and cats like Victor can get called for goaltending because
• 14:31
  Speaker 2: people just can't conceptualize that the ball is that high.
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: Like, have you heard Kevin Garnett tell.
• 14:36
  Speaker 2: Them stories about Olajuwon where Olajuwon talking.
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: He said, I am testing his lateral movement. I am
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: testing his lateral movement.
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: And Olajuwon used to get called for travels in the
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: playoffs and.
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: His thing was, they have never seen lateral movement.
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: Like, they simply could not imagine that this is not
• 14:52
  Speaker 2: against the rules. And then you watch the clips and
• 14:54
  Speaker 2: be like, yo, they were just not ready for the
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: lateral movement.
• 14:59
  Speaker 3: And one thing that I think people don't realize is
• 15:02
  Speaker 3: These guys don't have full battery packs while they play basketball.
• 15:07
  Speaker 3: And it's one of those things that makes 82 games
• 15:09
  Speaker 3: different from the playoffs is that Victor Wemby by trying
• 15:12
  Speaker 3: to block everything and jump and be locked in is
• 15:15
  Speaker 3: the same reason why Jalen Brunson moving off the ball
• 15:19
  Speaker 3: in the Knicks postseason run is so big that I
• 15:23
  Speaker 3: don't think people realize how hard it is in the
• 15:25
  Speaker 3: same way that Wemby is exhausting himself trying to protect
• 15:28
  Speaker 3: everything in the paint and block everything in the paint.
• 15:31
  Speaker 3: and he doesn't have any energy left offensively. It's the
• 15:34
  Speaker 3: same reason why Cat, Carl Anthony Towns, becoming the hub
• 15:38
  Speaker 3: of the offense and their flex offense and having Jalen
• 15:41
  Speaker 3: Brunson be able to get his heart rate down and
• 15:44
  Speaker 3: not have to dribble seven, literally 150 dribbles fewer per
• 15:49
  Speaker 3: game this postseason for Jalen Brunson than last postseason. That
• 15:54
  Speaker 3: matters in the terms of the stamina and the energy
• 15:57
  Speaker 3: that it takes to exhaust yourself through an NBA playoff game.
• 16:01
  Speaker 3: That is going to help the Knicks in ways that
• 16:03
  Speaker 3: I think Victor Wembanyama needs to chill a little bit
• 16:05
  Speaker 3: defensively in order, because I think there's some Rudy Gobert
• 16:10
  Speaker 3: mind games that are happening here where he wants to
• 16:12
  Speaker 3: prove himself to Rudy Gobert and his fellow Frenchmen in
• 16:16
  Speaker 3: ways that I think is detracting from the overall goal
• 16:19
  Speaker 3: of winning this series. It seems like he wants to
• 16:21
  Speaker 3: prove something to the guy that he used to go
• 16:24
  Speaker 3: up against, his big brother, so to speak. And we've
• 16:26
  Speaker 3: all been there. playing one-on-one against your big brother. And
• 16:30
  Speaker 3: it is something visceral. I used to cry every single
• 16:34
  Speaker 3: time in my backyard playing on my hoop with my brothers.
• 16:38
  Speaker 3: And every time it would be the same outcome. And
• 16:42
  Speaker 3: I just had this thing inside me that I wanted
• 16:44
  Speaker 3: to prove to my big brothers that I could beat
• 16:46
  Speaker 3: them one-on-one. And I think that's what's happening with Rudy
• 16:49
  Speaker 3: Gobert and Victor Webanyama here. And I think he needs
• 16:51
  Speaker 3: to recalibrate things to make himself more effective over the
• 16:54
  Speaker 3: long haul.
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: Hey, man, I got to go here because you brought
• 16:56
  Speaker 2: it up with the Knicks and going through Carl. And
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: I'm curious, where are you on Mike Brown.
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: As a coach?
• 17:03
  Speaker 3: I was out on him up until game four of
• 17:05
  Speaker 3: that series with the Atlanta Hawks, and then everything changed. Like,
• 17:08
  Speaker 3: to get Carl Anthony Towns to buy in being a
• 17:11
  Speaker 3: guy who was going to be a hub and not
• 17:13
  Speaker 3: worry about getting 25, he was more worried about, hey,
• 17:17
  Speaker 3: can you make sure that you get six assists a
• 17:21
  Speaker 3: game where you're going to make things so much easier
• 17:24
  Speaker 3: for everybody else. It's something Tom Thibodeau couldn't do. In
• 17:27
  Speaker 3: four games in that series, Carl Anthony Towns had more
• 17:30
  Speaker 3: assists than he did all of last season in the postseason.
• 17:34
  Speaker 3: 18-game sample size. He had, under Tom Thibodeau, he had
• 17:38
  Speaker 3: fewer assists in the entire postseason run to the Eastern
• 17:41
  Speaker 3: Conference Finals than he did in four games in that series.
• 17:45
  Speaker 3: against the Atlanta Hawks. So whatever Mike Brown did, because
• 17:48
  Speaker 3: we kind of felt like we slept walk through that
• 17:50
  Speaker 3: first 82 games of the season, I didn't see enough
• 17:54
  Speaker 3: to lend me to believe that he was reaching Jalen
• 17:56
  Speaker 3: Brunson and Carl Anthony Towns differently. The one thing he
• 17:59
  Speaker 3: did differently in the regular season was he lowered their
• 18:02
  Speaker 3: minutes totals and recognized we can't be running these dudes
• 18:05
  Speaker 3: into the ground. Mikel Bridges, OG Ananobi, Carl Anthony Towns,
• 18:10
  Speaker 3: Josh Hart, and Jalen Brunson, they played something like 35
• 18:13
  Speaker 3: minutes a game as a unit. in the postseason. As
• 18:18
  Speaker 3: a five-man lineup, those five guys are on the floor
• 18:20
  Speaker 3: about 30 minutes a game, and Mike Brown has established
• 18:23
  Speaker 3: two things. One, we're going to lower those minutes and
• 18:25
  Speaker 3: depend on the second unit a lot more to preserve
• 18:28
  Speaker 3: the energy of these guys. And two, we're going to
• 18:31
  Speaker 3: run the offense through Carl Anthony Towns to preserve Jalen Brunson.
• 18:35
  Speaker 3: And those two things, what they did at the second
• 18:37
  Speaker 3: half of that Atlanta Hawks series, makes me think a
• 18:40
  Speaker 3: lot better about Mike Brown's tenure over Tom Thibodeau.
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: I've always thought that Mike Brown was a bit underrated
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: as a coach. And I think like his success with
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: the Cavs was easily discounted because he had the cyborg
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: version of LeBron James. His time with the Lakers, I
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: think they find out that the owner's dying five games
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: into the second season of his tenure and they panic
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: and they decide to fire him after they've overhauled the
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: offense and everything else, right? Like I think He got
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: to the playoffs of Sacramento in a game seven. He's
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: clearly worked under some people where he's learned some things
• 19:18
  Speaker 2: and what his shortcoming was when he first started as
• 19:20
  Speaker 2: a coach was offense. His offenses were bogged down. Nope,
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: he did that apprenticeship under Steve Kerr. He seemed to
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: figure some things out. They got this thing going. And
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: then what happened in this, for the last, I guess
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: now four games of the Knicks, which is interesting, they
• 19:37
  Speaker 2: seem to turn it.
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: On, right? Which is something that's odd for a team
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: that's never really won anything.
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: They's like, okay, I think maybe we can just stop
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: fucking around here because we're better than everybody else that's
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: left in our conference. And it looks very clearly at
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: us of right now that they are, in fact, better
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: than everybody else that's in this conference.
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: Like they should win it.
• 19:57
  Speaker 2: And getting Carl Towns to buy in is interesting because
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: I think.
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: You and I would agree on this. He's an excellent passer.
• 20:04
  Speaker 2: The thing with Towns is he's an excellent everything if
• 20:07
  Speaker 2: he doesn't. Like, why he's not better is maddening and confusing.
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: But if you get him to be that passing guy,
• 20:15
  Speaker 2: because you can't have your 6'2 guard dribbling the ball.
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: James Harden is a 6'5 tank, and him dribbling the
• 20:20
  Speaker 2: ball over and over again has worn him.
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: Out postseason after postseason.
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: Like, I've seen people say that they think this series
• 20:27
  Speaker 2: with the Sixers is going to go a long time.
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: I don't. I think this is going to be quick.
• 20:31
  Speaker 3: For the Knicks, it's huge. The Carl Anthony Towns being
• 20:34
  Speaker 3: that Jokic, Shane Goon hub at the top of the key.
• 20:38
  Speaker 3: The Hawks haven't figured it out. The 76ers haven't figured
• 20:40
  Speaker 3: it out. It's a basic. Bomani, I played that offense
• 20:43
  Speaker 3: in high school. The flex, we call it motion. It's
• 20:49
  Speaker 3: the most easily teachable offense. And Mike Brown is installing
• 20:54
  Speaker 3: it as Carl Anthony Towns is at the top of
• 20:56
  Speaker 3: the key. And these defenses have no idea how to
• 20:58
  Speaker 3: stop it. And for me, it's like Tom Thibodeau, the
• 21:02
  Speaker 3: thing we kept talking about with Tibbs was this rigidity,
• 21:04
  Speaker 3: is that he just has this view, a narrow-minded view
• 21:07
  Speaker 3: of what works in the NBA, and that's always how
• 21:09
  Speaker 3: he's going to go. He went on a sabbatical. I
• 21:11
  Speaker 3: talked to him. He's like, yeah, I'm a new coach.
• 21:13
  Speaker 3: I went and I met with medical professionals and sports
• 21:16
  Speaker 3: scientists and all this, and he kept doing the same things.
• 21:19
  Speaker 3: Once he got right back in, we realized that the
• 21:20
  Speaker 3: tiger doesn't change his stripes. Mike Brown, I think the
• 21:24
  Speaker 3: tough thing about Mike Brown is, He learned the power
• 21:28
  Speaker 3: of having that big man as your hub with Damanis Sabonis.
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 21:34
  Speaker 3: And I don't know if that's a good selling pitch
• 21:37
  Speaker 3: for an NBA star. It's like, hey, man, look what
• 21:40
  Speaker 3: we did with Damanis Sabonis. You need to go do that, too.
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: I mean, I would say this.
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: Like, you turned Damanis Sabonis into a 60% shooter from
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: the floor and everything else.
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: Like... He turned Damanis Sabonis into something.
• 21:51
  Speaker 2: And by the way, with an all-time great offense by numbers,
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: it's not the worst celebration you're going to make.
• 21:57
  Speaker 3: I know what you're saying is, but for NBA stars,
• 22:00
  Speaker 3: do they want to be Damanis Sabonis? I don't know.
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: It's kind of like when George Carl told Carmelo, I
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: see dead left shrimp in you.
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 22:10
  Speaker 3: What was it? When Reggie Miller went out on national
• 22:14
  Speaker 3: TV and was like, you know, Caitlin Clark reminds me of?
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 22:18
  Speaker 3: Peyton Pritchard. It's like, Oh, right.
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: Kobe Bryant told Dwight Howard, you could be our Tyson Chandler.
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: It didn't understand why that went over poorly.
• 22:28
  Speaker 3: And, and, and you know what? We'll sue that is
• 22:31
  Speaker 3: when you're down one, two in a series and you
• 22:35
  Speaker 3: are given the keys to being the hub and everything
• 22:38
  Speaker 3: turns around for you. So, I don't know how sustainable
• 22:40
  Speaker 3: this is. It still worked against, against the Sixers and
• 22:43
  Speaker 3: Embiid just got ruined. Like they were putting them in
• 22:46
  Speaker 3: pick and rolls nonstop. And they were saying, we're going
• 22:48
  Speaker 3: to have you guard in space and we're going to
• 22:50
  Speaker 3: try to figure this out and wear you down after
• 22:53
  Speaker 3: having a couple of weeks out with the appendicitis. And, and, Man,
• 22:58
  Speaker 3: the Knicks look great, and I was out on them. Man, Bomani,
• 23:02
  Speaker 3: I pronounced them dead on the scene at the end
• 23:05
  Speaker 3: of that regular season down 2-1 against the Atlanta Hawks,
• 23:08
  Speaker 3: but kudos to Mike Brown and Carl Anthony Towns. We'll
• 23:11
  Speaker 3: see if this is sustainable. He had more assists in
• 23:14
  Speaker 3: this postseason than the first three postseason runs combined. This
• 23:18
  Speaker 3: is a new groove for him, man, and we say
• 23:21
  Speaker 3: that a Tiger can't change its stripes, but Carl Anthony Towns,
• 23:26
  Speaker 3: he's at this age and this stage of his career,
• 23:28
  Speaker 3: he's showing me something in ways that I did not
• 23:30
  Speaker 3: think he had it in him.
• 23:32
  Speaker 2: I was saying this one thing right before we go
• 23:34
  Speaker 2: into break, because you mentioned Thibodeau, and I think this
• 23:36
  Speaker 2: is funny, and I'm curious if you deserve this. Thibodeau,
• 23:39
  Speaker 2: Stan Van Gundy, very similar guys, right? Not necessarily, they're
• 23:43
  Speaker 2: not the same exact coach, but they are of similar schools,
• 23:45
  Speaker 2: and they both have the same thing in common. They
• 23:49
  Speaker 2: seem so happy when they're not coaching basketball. and so
• 23:52
  Speaker 2: miserable when they are, and I never understand why they
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: ever coach basketball.
• 23:57
  Speaker 3: It's weird. It's the Van Gundy tree, right? It's Steve
• 23:59
  Speaker 3: Clifford in Charlotte. When you see him on the sidelines
• 24:03
  Speaker 3: here in Charlotte, he was the former coach of the Hornets,
• 24:06
  Speaker 3: and oddly enough, also the Orlando Magic. So if people
• 24:08
  Speaker 3: are thinking Tom Thibodeau is going to take that magic job,
• 24:11
  Speaker 3: Steve Clifford did a similar thing there in Orlando. Steve
• 24:15
  Speaker 3: Clifford is like the happiest, most jovial dude But when
• 24:19
  Speaker 3: he's in between those four lines, he's as curmudgeon as
• 24:22
  Speaker 3: it gets. With Tom Thibodeau, Jeff Van Gundy, and Stan
• 24:24
  Speaker 3: Van Gundy, awesome to talk to off the floor. People
• 24:27
  Speaker 3: don't realize, Tom Thibodeau's a great hang on a TV set.
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: When he would walk around the seaport at ESPN, he
• 24:34
  Speaker 2: got a little swag to him.
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: He'd be like, look at me.
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: He's the guy to give you a point from across
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: the room.
• 24:39
  Speaker 3: I've hung out with Tom Thibodeau. I got lunch with him.
• 24:43
  Speaker 3: I've seen him even at the Sloan Conference. You're hanging out,
• 24:46
  Speaker 3: and I'm like, this is not the guy that I
• 24:49
  Speaker 3: thought you were. He is charismatic in a way when
• 24:54
  Speaker 3: he's not coaching that I think would surprise a lot
• 24:56
  Speaker 3: of people. But it is crazy is that all of
• 25:01
  Speaker 3: the stereotypes, the narratives about Tom Thibodeau oftentimes come true,
• 25:06
  Speaker 3: and we'll see if he gets another job here in
• 25:08
  Speaker 3: Orlando Magic. It sounds like the Billy Donovan left at
• 25:13
  Speaker 3: the altar story from a few years back. Maybe they
• 25:17
  Speaker 3: finally consummate that this time around. But, man, if Tom
• 25:21
  Speaker 3: Thibodeau takes that job, I would pray for Paolo Bencaro
• 25:24
  Speaker 3: and everybody else's knees and their miles on those tires
• 25:27
  Speaker 3: because it just doesn't seem like Tom Thibodeau is not
• 25:31
  Speaker 3: going to change.
• 25:31
  Speaker 2: Hey, man, I understand letting Mosley go, and I understood
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: the allure of of Billy Donovan in 2010 or whenever
• 25:42
  Speaker 2: that was that, you know, he left and then decided
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: to come back to Florida. After 10 years in the NBA,
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: Billy Donovan has demonstrated himself to be a replacement level
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: NBA coach.
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: Not bad, certainly, but no reason to think he's great.
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: I can't believe they are still that enamored with the
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: idea of hiring Billy Donovan.
• 26:03
  Speaker 3: That Florida Gators stuff is strong down there, man.
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it is.
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: It is.
• 26:08
  Speaker 3: So look, the, the, the Nick story is huge. It's
• 26:14
  Speaker 3: I feel like it's the most, it's hard to see
• 26:17
  Speaker 3: because we want our stars to be averaging 25, 30
• 26:20
  Speaker 3: a night. But when you have a guy who recalibrates
• 26:23
  Speaker 3: his whole portfolio of what he offers for your team,
• 26:26
  Speaker 3: like Carl Anthony towns and, and look, the defensive stuff,
• 26:30
  Speaker 3: He's been playing a lot better defensively and all the
• 26:33
  Speaker 3: ticky-tack fouls that we get so angry about.
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: That's the key.
• 26:36
  Speaker 3: With Carl Anthony Towns, that still might come up and
• 26:40
  Speaker 3: be the boogeyman in all this thing. He can be
• 26:42
  Speaker 3: the hub all he wants offensively, but if he's going
• 26:44
  Speaker 3: to be in foul trouble early against Joel Embiid like
• 26:48
  Speaker 3: he was, where it's like, oh man, that's still an
• 26:51
  Speaker 3: issue with Carl Anthony Towns. We're still only one game in.
• 26:54
  Speaker 3: But right now, I would say the Knicks, I feel
• 26:57
  Speaker 3: better about their chances than anybody else in the East.
• 26:59
  Speaker 2: All right, look, coming up next, I understand not everybody
• 27:03
  Speaker 2: thinks that talking too much on the internet is a
• 27:05
  Speaker 2: tradable offense.
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: But what if I do? Talk about Jalen Brown.
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  Speaker 2: hyphen offer hyphen terms. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp.
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• 29:26
  Speaker 2: we are back with Tom Haverstraw. Tom, Jalen Brown, we've
• 29:30
  Speaker 2: talked about this a little bit here. He got on
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: the live stream talking crazy. The NBA found a $ 50, 000
• 29:35
  Speaker 2: for claiming that the referees had an agenda against him.
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: And by the way, I think it's.
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: Entirely possible that they do. I don't know if this
• 29:43
  Speaker 2: is correct. I don't watch them enough to know if
• 29:45
  Speaker 2: he's really being officiated unfairly.
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: But it's on the board.
• 29:48
  Speaker 2: They are kind of petty like that. It's not like
• 29:51
  Speaker 2: it's never happened before. However, I bring him up just
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: because I think the window is probably closed for the Celtics.
• 30:02
  Speaker 2: Jalen Brown has played 10 years in the NBA. I
• 30:07
  Speaker 2: don't know what version of Jason Tatum they're going to
• 30:10
  Speaker 2: get back. Most people have said that Jalen Brown has
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: been an all-NBA caliber player this year, a top five
• 30:16
  Speaker 2: in the MVP vote, and that is largely buoyed by
• 30:19
  Speaker 2: the team's success of the Boston Celtics. But Tom Habershow,
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: I ask you this, as you're the sort of person
• 30:25
  Speaker 2: who pays attention to these things, Have you taken a
• 30:28
  Speaker 2: look at the Jalen Brown on-court, off-court differences from this season?
• 30:34
  Speaker 3: This is why I did not have him on my
• 30:36
  Speaker 3: first or second team All-NBA. Because the team was not
• 30:40
  Speaker 3: just on-court, off-court, the differential. And this is one of
• 30:44
  Speaker 3: those things why the Nikoli Jokic analytics, how he became...
• 30:50
  Speaker 3: the patron saint of analytics is a lot of the
• 30:52
  Speaker 3: introduction of on-court, off-court metrics. And what that is, is
• 30:57
  Speaker 3: in the play-by-play era since 1997, we can now see
• 31:02
  Speaker 3: how well your team does when you're on the floor,
• 31:04
  Speaker 3: meaning how many points does your team score minus how
• 31:08
  Speaker 3: many points your opponent scores. And that differential, how does
• 31:11
  Speaker 3: that look? That margin of victory, what does that differential
• 31:15
  Speaker 3: look like when you're off the floor? And for Jalen Brown,
• 31:19
  Speaker 3: It was very confusing because a lot of people were saying, hey,
• 31:22
  Speaker 3: he's carrying that Boston Celtics team. But their record this
• 31:26
  Speaker 3: season without Jalen Brown was fantastic this season. Without Jalen
• 31:33
  Speaker 3: Brown in uniform, they were still a 50-win team and
• 31:36
  Speaker 3: even better without him in uniform. And then you go
• 31:40
  Speaker 3: to the in-game, on-court, off-court metrics, and it does not
• 31:45
  Speaker 3: paint a pretty picture about Jalen Brown's ability to raise
• 31:49
  Speaker 3: your team's ability to win games was not favorable to
• 31:53
  Speaker 3: Jalen Brown this season.
• 31:54
  Speaker 2: And just to be clear for people, offensively with him
• 31:58
  Speaker 2: and without him, they were roughly the same this year.
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: Not exactly, but they were worse.
• 32:03
  Speaker 2: But it was too close to be like, oh, they
• 32:06
  Speaker 2: were worse without him on offense, right?
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: That would be a bit dishonest.
• 32:09
  Speaker 2: But defensively, the gap was a little bit bigger. They
• 32:11
  Speaker 2: were better defensively without him. And in this postseason, they
• 32:16
  Speaker 2: were way better.
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: When he was not on the floor than when he
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: was on the floor.
• 32:21
  Speaker 2: And looking at those numbers and them being combined with
• 32:25
  Speaker 2: the sort of things he was saying about enjoying this
• 32:28
  Speaker 2: season the most out of any other season, I would
• 32:31
  Speaker 2: love to know how the rest of the Celtics felt
• 32:33
  Speaker 2: about this, because even if they aren't looking at that,
• 32:37
  Speaker 2: I don't talk about players, even if they aren't necessarily
• 32:39
  Speaker 2: looking at the numbers, they know intuitively.
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: Hey man, we're actually better when he's not here. Right?
• 32:45
  Speaker 2: Like, I don't think you have to hand them to
• 32:47
  Speaker 2: stat sheet. They may be like, you know, I felt
• 32:48
  Speaker 2: like it was going that way, but they are quantified.
• 32:51
  Speaker 2: They were quantifiably and clearly better without him this year.
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: Yes. Yes.
• 32:56
  Speaker 3: And when you talk about him saying on a stream,
• 33:00
  Speaker 3: He knows what he's doing. This is one of the
• 33:02
  Speaker 3: most calculated guys in the league. He knows what he's saying.
• 33:06
  Speaker 3: He is out here on a live stream where he
• 33:10
  Speaker 3: knows how big of his audience is and he knows
• 33:12
  Speaker 3: that it's going to be clipped and aggregated where he
• 33:15
  Speaker 3: says so much by just saying this was my favorite
• 33:18
  Speaker 3: year in the NBA.
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 33:21
  Speaker 3: But, Mani, it's a wrap. It's a wrap after that
• 33:26
  Speaker 3: because you had Jason Tatum over here. Out with an
• 33:31
  Speaker 3: Achilles tear, rehabbing out of the picture and having an
• 33:36
  Speaker 3: NBC documentary about his recovery and coming back and this
• 33:40
  Speaker 3: whole movie that is being produced over here. But Jalen
• 33:46
  Speaker 3: Brown is the main character of this other movie, which is,
• 33:50
  Speaker 3: I'm the number one guy on a 50-win team. I
• 33:53
  Speaker 3: told you all I can do this. I won a championship.
• 33:56
  Speaker 3: I won the Eastern Conference Finals MVP. And I won
• 33:59
  Speaker 3: the Finals MVP. And you guys still didn't believe me.
• 34:03
  Speaker 3: And this is why Jalen Brown is so happy with
• 34:06
  Speaker 3: this season, because he proved... to himself that with a
• 34:11
  Speaker 3: roster that I don't think people, I think the over-under
• 34:13
  Speaker 3: on the Celtics this season was like 42 wins, 41.
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: And a half.
• 34:18
  Speaker 3: They won 56 games this year. And for most people,
• 34:21
  Speaker 3: they're not going to be looking at on-court, off-court numbers.
• 34:24
  Speaker 3: They're just going to look at 56 wins with Jalen
• 34:26
  Speaker 3: Brown and an Achilles tear for Jason Tatum and say
• 34:29
  Speaker 3: that guy deserves to be a number one on another
• 34:31
  Speaker 3: team or have his own team. But the on-court, off-court
• 34:35
  Speaker 3: numbers were disastrous for him this season. Peyton Pritchard coming
• 34:38
  Speaker 3: off the bench, much better for the Celtics this season.
• 34:43
  Speaker 3: But one thing I will say about Jalen Brown, man,
• 34:47
  Speaker 3: the 56 wins mattered a lot more than his effective
• 34:53
  Speaker 3: field goal percentage. His ability to shoot efficiently is different
• 34:56
  Speaker 3: than what I think people realize they saw, he is
• 34:59
  Speaker 3: averaging a damn near 30 points per game this season.
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 35:03
  Speaker 3: But what they didn't show you is that his effective
• 35:06
  Speaker 3: field goal percentage, meaning once you incorporate the extra value
• 35:09
  Speaker 3: of the three pointer, uh, it's like slugging percentage in baseball.
• 35:13
  Speaker 3: It's not efficient basketball. He's shooting 22 times a game
• 35:18
  Speaker 3: and he's not doing a great job of making the
• 35:20
  Speaker 3: most out of those scoring opportunities. And so, yes, he
• 35:23
  Speaker 3: is averaging close to 30 points a game, but, but
• 35:25
  Speaker 3: he was very in the bottom percentile in terms of
• 35:28
  Speaker 3: efficiency and in the playoffs that reared its ugly head.
• 35:32
  Speaker 3: And without Jason Tatum playing in that game, everything kind
• 35:36
  Speaker 3: of crumbled for the Boston Celtics. And I do think
• 35:38
  Speaker 3: that Jason Tatum is going to feel a certain way
• 35:39
  Speaker 3: about those comments. And I think that's the point. I
• 35:42
  Speaker 3: think Jalen Brown wanted Jason Tatum to feel like, Hey,
• 35:46
  Speaker 3: this was my favorite year without you on the floor.
• 35:49
  Speaker 2: And this is, I think there's some extension that he
• 35:52
  Speaker 2: is eligible to receive, uh, in this year and NBA
• 35:55
  Speaker 2: teams now we're all about signing these guys up for
• 35:57
  Speaker 2: the money. Cause the $ 70 million sounds crazy now, but
• 36:00
  Speaker 2: as the cap changes and everything else, right? Like maybe
• 36:03
  Speaker 2: you feel like you're getting in on a discount doing
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: this as it goes, but they, Brad.
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: Stevens has a lot to figure out. Um, it's fair
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: to ask if he's going to have to figure out something.
• 36:12
  Speaker 2: About his coach, because while I find his coach to
• 36:14
  Speaker 2: be a lovely personality, um, How far you can go
• 36:20
  Speaker 2: with this style of ball.
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: Of course, yes, they've won a championship, but that roster
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: was loaded.
• 36:24
  Speaker 2: Like, I think it's very easy for us to forget
• 36:26
  Speaker 2: that Derek White's the fifth best player on that team.
• 36:30
  Speaker 2: That's not what this roster is going to look like.
• 36:32
  Speaker 2: I'd seen it being proposed. Well, maybe you can somehow
• 36:34
  Speaker 2: turn Jalen Brown into Giannis. And I think Jalen Brown
• 36:37
  Speaker 2: would love nothing more than to be on a team
• 36:39
  Speaker 2: like the Bucs with nothing to do but go get buckets. Like,
• 36:42
  Speaker 2: I've already got my ring. I've been to the finals
• 36:44
  Speaker 2: a couple times. It's been the first 10 years of
• 36:45
  Speaker 2: my career going to the playoffs. Let me go out
• 36:47
  Speaker 2: here and get these buckets.
• 36:50
  Speaker 3: Well, Bomani, are we going to talk about the fact
• 36:53
  Speaker 3: that that 24 run was maybe the easiest path we
• 36:56
  Speaker 3: have seen for a championship team in terms of the
• 36:58
  Speaker 3: injuries that they didn't have to face? Jimmy Butler, that
• 37:01
  Speaker 3: Cavs team was shorthanded. Pacers team was shorthanded. And then
• 37:04
  Speaker 3: they go against the Dallas Mavericks. And yes, they beat
• 37:07
  Speaker 3: that Dallas Mavericks team, but they were not a juggernaut
• 37:09
  Speaker 3: going into the postseason. It was Luka Doncic's first run
• 37:12
  Speaker 3: there in the finals. So if you want to talk
• 37:14
  Speaker 3: paths to the NBA finals and the championship, we did
• 37:17
  Speaker 3: the whole asterisk thing last year with the Oklahoma City Thunder.
• 37:21
  Speaker 3: If you haven't read it, I write this every year,
• 37:24
  Speaker 3: is I put an asterisk on every NBA championship because
• 37:27
  Speaker 3: if you want to, we can play that game with
• 37:30
  Speaker 3: just about every title team. That's something weird happened along
• 37:32
  Speaker 3: the way. So I am not out here saying... that
• 37:36
  Speaker 3: the Celtics were lucky in ways that other champions are not.
• 37:41
  Speaker 3: I'm just saying we have to remind ourselves the path
• 37:44
  Speaker 3: that they had going to the NBA Finals that season,
• 37:48
  Speaker 3: the path was laid down by a bunch of guys
• 37:50
  Speaker 3: in street clothes in ways that we have not seen
• 37:53
  Speaker 3: in a long time.
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and I mean, yeah, all of that is correct.
• 37:58
  Speaker 2: And that was, they're another team that was kind of
• 38:00
  Speaker 2: like the Nuggets in the sense that... The Nuggets window
• 38:04
  Speaker 2: had opened before people fully.
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: Realized it was open. It's just that Jamal Murray was hurt, right?
• 38:09
  Speaker 2: And so 23 was toward the end of the window.
• 38:12
  Speaker 2: The beginning was actually 21, and then Murray got hurt.
• 38:15
  Speaker 2: The Celtics had been so good for so long. How
• 38:17
  Speaker 2: long do we think the window really was, right? Like
• 38:19
  Speaker 2: they've kept this thing up for like 10 years. At
• 38:22
  Speaker 2: some point, that has to slow down, and that would
• 38:24
  Speaker 2: have been independent of Tatum and the Achilles injury where.
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: It is amazing that he came back, but I think.
• 38:30
  Speaker 2: It was solidified that he's not going to be the
• 38:33
  Speaker 2: player that he was ever again. That's just too much
• 38:35
  Speaker 2: to ask out of somebody, especially because he has a
• 38:37
  Speaker 2: very physically demanding game.
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 38:39
  Speaker 3: Do you think a little bit of Brad Stevens is
• 38:41
  Speaker 3: glad that they lost this series in a way that
• 38:43
  Speaker 3: now he has the pretext to break this thing up
• 38:45
  Speaker 3: and the fans wouldn't revolt?
• 38:48
  Speaker 2: That is a very interesting question because you can't break
• 38:51
  Speaker 2: it up as good as they had been. They did
• 38:52
  Speaker 2: it a little bit at a time though, right? Like
• 38:54
  Speaker 2: for tax reasons, get Drew Holiday.
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: Out of here.
• 38:57
  Speaker 2: Got Porzingis out of there a little bit at a time.
• 39:00
  Speaker 2: That is what they did.
• 39:02
  Speaker 1: Now, so what do you do?
• 39:04
  Speaker 2: You keep Tatum, you trade Jalen Brown. I don't know
• 39:06
  Speaker 2: what you get for Jalen Brown, though, do you?
• 39:10
  Speaker 3: So this week on the Kevin O'Connor show, the Yahoo
• 39:13
  Speaker 3: Sports show that we do, he proposed Giannis to Boston,
• 39:20
  Speaker 3: Jalen Brown to Atlanta, and then picks and young pieces
• 39:24
  Speaker 3: from Atlanta and Boston going to Milwaukee. in a way
• 39:28
  Speaker 3: that you get a start player that is on the
• 39:31
  Speaker 3: other side of 30 for the Boston Celtics. And you
• 39:35
  Speaker 3: have that kind of force in the two point area
• 39:37
  Speaker 3: going downhill and getting buckets and have Joe Missoula's three
• 39:41
  Speaker 3: point offense. It might work with Giannis and Jalen Brown
• 39:45
  Speaker 3: goes home to Atlanta. I'm not sure. The history of
• 39:48
  Speaker 3: the NBA suggests that coming home is not all that
• 39:51
  Speaker 3: it's cracked up to be. We can have LeBron James
• 39:53
  Speaker 3: going back home to Cleveland, and that was a storybook
• 39:56
  Speaker 3: fairytale ending there. But most of the time, guys, NBA
• 39:59
  Speaker 3: stars going back home, it does not work out for them.
• 40:02
  Speaker 3: So that is interesting to me is that the Atlanta
• 40:05
  Speaker 3: Hawks have the number one overall pick potentially in this
• 40:08
  Speaker 3: draft because of the New Orleans Pelicans trade last year,
• 40:13
  Speaker 3: and they could get Jalen Brown for– probably not a
• 40:15
  Speaker 3: lot in terms of the assets and the, and the, the,
• 40:19
  Speaker 3: the trade that you would have to make to get
• 40:20
  Speaker 3: Jalen Brown. I just, I'm not as much of a
• 40:24
  Speaker 3: Jalen Brown guy and Jason Tatum. I feel like, I
• 40:28
  Speaker 3: feel like Boston got that championship out in 2024, but
• 40:32
  Speaker 3: part of me thinks that Brad Stevens is relieved that
• 40:36
  Speaker 3: he can go to the lab and figure out what
• 40:39
  Speaker 3: is the best opportunity for me to improve this Boston
• 40:42
  Speaker 3: Celtics roster and without having Jalen Brown and Jason Tatum
• 40:47
  Speaker 3: feeling that I have to force that marriage to work.
• 40:49
  Speaker 3: Because it does seem like with Jalen Brown's comments and
• 40:51
  Speaker 3: this season and the early out against the 76ers, that
• 40:55
  Speaker 3: he has as ready of a ripe opportunity to make
• 40:58
  Speaker 3: a pivot here than I think he's had in a
• 41:00
  Speaker 3: long time, if ever.
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: And also, let us.
• 41:02
  Speaker 2: Not forget that this is a team full of guys
• 41:05
  Speaker 2: that Brad Stevens is like, hey, I don't want to
• 41:06
  Speaker 2: coach them anymore.
• 41:08
  Speaker 3: That's a good point, too.
• 41:11
  Speaker 2: There are levels at which he's looking at all these
• 41:12
  Speaker 2: guys like, eh. Hey, I don't know if I don't
• 41:17
  Speaker 2: know if I would want to have to do this.
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: Maybe you guys could do it. But where are you
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: on Missoula? Because I do understand. I do think that
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: part of what got.
• 41:25
  Speaker 2: Them in that series was a bit of the rigidity
• 41:27
  Speaker 2: of Missoula ball. And we're just going to keep chucking
• 41:29
  Speaker 2: these threes up here. There's nothing in there for let
• 41:32
  Speaker 2: me get a quick bucket right fast.
• 41:35
  Speaker 3: Well, I could not believe that he was starting Ron
• 41:37
  Speaker 3: Harper Jr., Luka Garza, and Baylor Shireman in that game seven.
• 41:42
  Speaker 3: I felt like that was a statement in ways that
• 41:46
  Speaker 3: he was trying to flex in ways that was his downfall.
• 41:50
  Speaker 3: And when I'm watching that series, in no way was
• 41:53
  Speaker 3: I like, oh, you know who's the missing piece here?
• 41:55
  Speaker 3: Is Ron Harper Jr. and Luka Garza. Just didn't make
• 41:58
  Speaker 3: any sense to me. I know that they had to
• 41:59
  Speaker 3: scramble without Jason Tatum and they wanted to keep that
• 42:01
  Speaker 3: second unit intact. but it did not look like Joe
• 42:05
  Speaker 3: Mazzulla was coaching with maximizing his potential to win this series.
• 42:11
  Speaker 3: It seemed like he was trying to say something else.
• 42:13
  Speaker 3: I don't know what that is, but the rigidity that
• 42:16
  Speaker 3: you mentioned, the three-point volume, analytics, to me, analytics is misbranded.
• 42:24
  Speaker 3: I've always said that analytics is the study of what wins. Bomani.
• 42:30
  Speaker 3: It is not dogmatic in that you must take this
• 42:32
  Speaker 3: many threes in order to win basketball games. It is
• 42:34
  Speaker 3: that if you study the length of the NBA history,
• 42:37
  Speaker 3: that three is more than two, and it was undervalued
• 42:39
  Speaker 3: in the way that on-base percentage was undervalued in baseball.
• 42:43
  Speaker 3: But that evolves. You cannot be dogmatic about what wins
• 42:48
  Speaker 3: in the NBA because as rules change and as defenses
• 42:52
  Speaker 3: change and as trends change, And the circumstances change. Jason
• 42:56
  Speaker 3: Tatum is out. We're in the playoffs. We need to
• 42:58
  Speaker 3: win this one game. Point differential doesn't matter anymore. In
• 43:03
  Speaker 3: the regular season, you might go maximal point differential is
• 43:07
  Speaker 3: that in the long run, shooting this many threes is
• 43:10
  Speaker 3: going to help us to maximize our point differential in
• 43:13
  Speaker 3: an 82-game season. But in a win-one-game situation, the math changes.
• 43:20
  Speaker 3: And so I don't want to blame analytics in general
• 43:23
  Speaker 3: as a, like Joe Missoula believes too much in the
• 43:26
  Speaker 3: three point shot. I think that he just went too
• 43:30
  Speaker 3: overboard with believing that that'll win in an 82 game season.
• 43:33
  Speaker 3: And we won in 24 using that. And I think
• 43:37
  Speaker 3: sometimes you need to recalibrate what you want to do
• 43:41
  Speaker 3: offensively in order to maximize that one game. And that's tough.
• 43:45
  Speaker 3: If you've been preaching one thing the entire season to
• 43:48
  Speaker 3: adapt in the Doesn't seem like that's Joe Missoula's strength there.
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: All right.
• 43:52
  Speaker 2: I will switch gears right fast as we get out
• 43:54
  Speaker 2: of here where I saw something interesting.
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: Have you seen this?
• 43:57
  Speaker 2: The athletic survey, right? I think it's the player survey
• 44:00
  Speaker 2: with all kinds of stuff. Most underrated player, most overrated player, best,
• 44:03
  Speaker 2: you know, all that type stuff, right? Fascinates me about this.
• 44:08
  Speaker 2: There's 151 votes cast for the most underrated player in
• 44:11
  Speaker 2: the league. Nobody got more than 4%.
• 44:16
  Speaker 1: Of those votes.
• 44:16
  Speaker 2: Like it's a, it seems to be a decent cluster
• 44:19
  Speaker 2: of the same guys, but it doesn't sound like guys
• 44:22
  Speaker 2: just really get that passionate or worked up about talking
• 44:25
  Speaker 2: about who the most underrated player is. Most overrated only
• 44:29
  Speaker 2: has 81 votes, which implies that people are falling back
• 44:32
  Speaker 2: off at Alvin, but buddy, the distributions are a bit
• 44:35
  Speaker 2: more concentrated. 12% of that 81 say Alpie Shingu. Up next,
• 44:41
  Speaker 2: Rudy Gobert. After that, Trae Young was tied with Rudy Gobert.
• 44:45
  Speaker 2: Then Carl Anthony Towns. Then a tie for Paolo Bancaro
• 44:49
  Speaker 2: and John Moran. And I have to say, I believe
• 44:52
  Speaker 2: we are at a point where it is impossible to
• 44:54
  Speaker 2: call Rudy Gobert overrated. I think it is very clear
• 44:58
  Speaker 2: that he got, we've been so down on Rudy that
• 45:00
  Speaker 2: he has clearly become underrated.
• 45:03
  Speaker 3: Do you think that we are nuanced enough or that
• 45:07
  Speaker 3: we have the ability to hold two thoughts at one time,
• 45:10
  Speaker 3: which is Rudy Gobert is a flawed offensive player, but defensively,
• 45:15
  Speaker 3: he still is an incredible, one of the greatest defenders
• 45:18
  Speaker 3: of all time.
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 45:21
  Speaker 3: And if he gets tripped up by Luka Doncic, or
• 45:23
  Speaker 3: if it's going to be Dylan Harper or D Aaron
• 45:26
  Speaker 3: Fox in this series, uh, We don't hold that against him.
• 45:30
  Speaker 3: We don't ask Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to guard Michael Jordan out
• 45:33
  Speaker 3: at the three-point line in a game-saving moment. But we
• 45:36
  Speaker 3: do it with Rudy Gobert.
• 45:38
  Speaker 2: I think it is amazing how well he plays when
• 45:41
  Speaker 2: he gets switched out on the perimeter on these guys
• 45:44
  Speaker 2: at 7-3. But it is all jokes somehow when the
• 45:48
  Speaker 2: 7-3 guy can't guard.
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: Luka Doncic at the top of the key. It's nuts, man.
• 45:54
  Speaker 2: Like, the idea that you even let him try is
• 45:56
  Speaker 2: a testament to what is good about him.
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: Now, you see guys like.
• 46:00
  Speaker 2: DeMarcus Cousins that always made this point, and I understood this,
• 46:03
  Speaker 2: that can you say that Gobert is the best defensive
• 46:05
  Speaker 2: player in the league if his impact is really just
• 46:08
  Speaker 2: as a team defender and that it doesn't necessarily bear
• 46:12
  Speaker 2: itself out when he's matched one-on-one with somebody? That was
• 46:14
  Speaker 2: the big thing about this series against Jokic. You know,
• 46:17
  Speaker 2: the Jamal Murray brother, I have 47 story, right? I'm
• 46:20
  Speaker 2: just like, Yogi's putting these huge numbers up on him.
• 46:23
  Speaker 2: And you're like, okay, you can have all this team
• 46:25
  Speaker 2: defense impact. But if somebody is just being guarded by
• 46:28
  Speaker 2: Rudy Gobert and they can light him up, how good
• 46:30
  Speaker 2: is he actually? I understand that argument, but he is
• 46:34
  Speaker 2: a game wrecking defensive force. Always has been. It just
• 46:39
  Speaker 2: gets dogged. Like no player as good as him has
• 46:42
  Speaker 2: ever been more disrespected by his peers.
• 46:45
  Speaker 3: Well, what he did was he completely changed Nikola Jokic's legacy.
• 46:49
  Speaker 3: And we're not going to give that to Rudy Gobert.
• 46:51
  Speaker 3: We're going to say it's a shortcoming of Nikola Jokic
• 46:53
  Speaker 3: that he wasn't able to win that series. And the
• 46:56
  Speaker 3: credit is not going to go to Rudy Gobert. It's not.
• 46:58
  Speaker 3: That's not how the conversation works. But I can't leave
• 47:01
  Speaker 3: without talking to you about the Nikola Jokic conversation here.
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: Let's go.
• 47:07
  Speaker 3: You've texted me on the side about the Jokic stat.
• 47:13
  Speaker 3: of him not playing with an all-star, all-NBA, defensive player
• 47:18
  Speaker 3: of the year, all-defense player up until this season. Jamal
• 47:21
  Speaker 3: Murray was the first time this season that Nikola Jokic
• 47:24
  Speaker 3: had an all-star or an all-NBA player or all-defensive. He
• 47:28
  Speaker 3: still hasn't had an all-defensive guy on his team. It's
• 47:32
  Speaker 3: never happened before with an MVP in NBA history. We've
• 47:36
  Speaker 3: never seen a guy through 10 years not have a
• 47:39
  Speaker 3: single teammate while playing with that guy the MVP, not
• 47:43
  Speaker 3: playing with an All-NBA or All-Star player. It's incredible. The
• 47:48
  Speaker 3: average that we have seen in NBA history up until
• 47:51
  Speaker 3: this point in Jokic's career, the number of All-NBA accolades,
• 47:57
  Speaker 3: whether that's All-Star, All-NBA, or All-Defense, is 16 accolades at
• 48:03
  Speaker 3: this point by teammates. And he had zero coming into
• 48:06
  Speaker 3: this season. Jamal Murray finally got the All-Star. And the
• 48:10
  Speaker 3: funny thing happened was he turned into a pumpkin in
• 48:12
  Speaker 3: the postseason. So it's like he can't win. I'm not
• 48:16
  Speaker 3: making excuses for Jokic, but if you had Jokic with Giannis,
• 48:21
  Speaker 3: this is a different conversation about whether Jokic is really
• 48:24
  Speaker 3: that dude. At this point in his career, Magic Johnson
• 48:29
  Speaker 3: had 38 wins. teammate accolades, whether it's all-stars, all-NBA, all-defense
• 48:35
  Speaker 3: Michael Cooper, Kareem.
• 48:36
  Speaker 1: Abdul-Jabbar, A.C.
• 48:37
  Speaker 3: Green, Norm Nixon, all these guys, James Worthy, Jokic has
• 48:41
  Speaker 3: not had one of those guys. And We've seen it
• 48:44
  Speaker 3: twice with Jamal Murray going on an all-time run in
• 48:47
  Speaker 3: the postseason. But outside of those two runs in the
• 48:50
  Speaker 3: bubble and after that, the championship run, Jamal Murray's just
• 48:53
  Speaker 3: been a 20-point scorer. And he shot 35% in this
• 48:57
  Speaker 3: series against Minnesota. And the whole entire referendum is about Jokic.
• 49:03
  Speaker 3: And I just feel like the supporting cast conversation, the
• 49:07
  Speaker 3: individualism of the NBA that's happening, I feel like we're...
• 49:13
  Speaker 3: We're trying to take down Yo Kitchen through the lens
• 49:15
  Speaker 3: of analytics, but I think this is a straw man.
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: Yes. I think.
• 49:20
  Speaker 3: him being the patron saint of analytics, he won those
• 49:25
  Speaker 3: MVPs because he averaged a triple-double.
• 49:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 49:29
  Speaker 2: Well, it's funny because I was talking about what's really
• 49:31
  Speaker 2: happened is it's a pushback against the dorks is what
• 49:34
  Speaker 2: this has been. And people are like, oh, you're not
• 49:36
  Speaker 2: a Jokic dork. I'm not in this with Jokic for
• 49:39
  Speaker 2: the dork stuff. The eye test was good enough for me.
• 49:42
  Speaker 2: The dork stuff was also there, but I felt like
• 49:44
  Speaker 2: people just got too ahead of themselves. And this is
• 49:47
  Speaker 2: one of the 10 best players in the NBA.
• 49:48
  Speaker 3: Well, where did that come from? Is that a straw
• 49:51
  Speaker 3: man too, the top 10 NBA?
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: Did I miss this?
• 49:54
  Speaker 2: I think that's a wing of internet chatter that I
• 49:57
  Speaker 2: have seen. It's like the people who will tell you
• 49:59
  Speaker 2: that Jokic is better than Akeem Olajuwon.
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: For example.
• 50:02
  Speaker 2: Now, Olajuwon becomes an interesting point because I wonder what
• 50:05
  Speaker 2: people would have said about Olajuwon from 87 to like
• 50:09
  Speaker 2: 91 or 92 when they weren't winning any series and
• 50:13
  Speaker 2: he was out there by himself. Would you have talked
• 50:15
  Speaker 2: about Olajuwon the same way? The comp, I did a
• 50:18
  Speaker 2: pod with Ethan yesterday. To me, the comp with Jokic
• 50:22
  Speaker 2: that I hadn't really thought about until recently, what if
• 50:25
  Speaker 2: the comp is David Robinson? where David Robinson was an
• 50:28
  Speaker 2: advanced stat monster and also one of the greatest players
• 50:31
  Speaker 2: that we'd ever seen. And until Tim Duncan showed up,
• 50:34
  Speaker 2: never had anybody there with him to really put up
• 50:38
  Speaker 2: a fight, except for like the two years of Dennis Rodman,
• 50:40
  Speaker 2: if you want to say that that's the same thing.
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: Duncan came.
• 50:44
  Speaker 2: I still think Robinson was the best player on the
• 50:46
  Speaker 2: team when that first year with Duncan. Duncan was the
• 50:48
  Speaker 2: center of the offense, but David Robinson was still an
• 50:50
  Speaker 2: excellent player. But we dogged David Robinson out largely because
• 50:54
  Speaker 2: of one series. But that was the only time he
• 50:58
  Speaker 2: got to the conference finals before Tim Duncan showed up.
• 51:02
  Speaker 2: Jokic had done more with his guys than David Robinson, who, again,
• 51:08
  Speaker 2: if you're too young to remember it, you drop David
• 51:11
  Speaker 2: Robinson off right now, David Robinson.
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: Is killing the NBA. David Robinson was so extraordinary and special.
• 51:19
  Speaker 2: As my daddy always says, he almost got Navy to
• 51:22
  Speaker 2: the final four, right?
• 51:23
  Speaker 1: Like David Robinson was that guy.
• 51:25
  Speaker 2: Jokic, I think, actually has a career at this peak
• 51:29
  Speaker 2: that kind of matches up with what Robinson had been.
• 51:31
  Speaker 2: Different types of players, but similar performance and similar shortcomings
• 51:35
  Speaker 2: with what was around him. If in the end, what
• 51:39
  Speaker 2: we say about Jokic is he's as good as David Robinson.
• 51:42
  Speaker 2: That's a hell of a compliment, no matter what anybody
• 51:44
  Speaker 2: says or anybody remembers.
• 51:46
  Speaker 3: What about the KG thing? Because I remember talking to
• 51:48
  Speaker 3: Chris Bosh about this when I was covering the Miami Heat.
• 51:51
  Speaker 3: I sat down with KG. I mean, I sat down
• 51:54
  Speaker 3: with Chris Bosh talking about his quote unquote legacy and
• 51:58
  Speaker 3: winning a championship and how that changed his legacy and
• 52:00
  Speaker 3: what people think of Chris Bosh and going to Miami
• 52:04
  Speaker 3: and what that did for his how people remember Chris Bosh.
• 52:08
  Speaker 3: And he thinks very positively. Obviously, after 2011, he didn't
• 52:11
  Speaker 3: feel good about that.
• 52:12
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 52:13
  Speaker 3: But 2012 and 2013, the way that he came back
• 52:15
  Speaker 3: from it, his abdominal strain, his groin basically detached from
• 52:19
  Speaker 3: his body in that series. And he came back, beat
• 52:23
  Speaker 3: KG and went to the NBA finals and was able
• 52:27
  Speaker 3: to vindicate himself in ways that people don't realize how
• 52:30
  Speaker 3: much hate. Like we think about LeBron's legacy was in
• 52:33
  Speaker 3: the balance. Skip Bayless was out on ESPN calling him
• 52:38
  Speaker 3: Bosh Spice.
• 52:39
  Speaker 2: And Chris Bosh got on TV with him and asked
• 52:42
  Speaker 2: him to stop.
• 52:43
  Speaker 1: And he said, no. And he didn't slap him.
• 52:49
  Speaker 3: So this, this, this whole thing comes back to Jokic
• 52:52
  Speaker 3: because Chris Bosh told me that while KG was destroying
• 52:58
  Speaker 3: him in the playoffs year after year, At that 2010
• 53:02
  Speaker 3: free agency, he reached out to KG and said, yo,
• 53:07
  Speaker 3: you left Minnesota, and I have an opportunity to leave
• 53:11
  Speaker 3: Toronto to try to change my narrative about, change my situation.
• 53:16
  Speaker 3: And he goes, man, loyalty is overrated. KG told him,
• 53:20
  Speaker 3: loyalty is overrated. Go. Leave Toronto and go somewhere else.
• 53:25
  Speaker 3: And that gave Chris Bosh... the emotional fortitude that if
• 53:29
  Speaker 3: KG tells me to do it, and I saw what
• 53:32
  Speaker 3: happened with KG's legacy and the way that the Boston
• 53:34
  Speaker 3: Celtics changed everything for KG, and he had Wally Zerbiak
• 53:39
  Speaker 3: and Tom Gugliotta riding with him for so many years,
• 53:43
  Speaker 3: Chris Bosh said, thank you, KG, because I took control
• 53:46
  Speaker 3: of this situation and it changed the way people talk
• 53:48
  Speaker 3: about me forever.
• 53:50
  Speaker 1: So thank you.
• 53:50
  Speaker 3: He owed a lot of gratitude to the guy that
• 53:52
  Speaker 3: was shit-talking him in ways that would make you cry.
• 53:57
  Speaker 3: in the middle of the 94 feet. But Chris Bosh
• 53:59
  Speaker 3: always gave that nod to KG and thanked him. And
• 54:04
  Speaker 3: in that analysis of fewest star teammates through 10 years,
• 54:09
  Speaker 3: 11 years in their career, there's only two guys. It's KG,
• 54:14
  Speaker 3: Kevin Garnett, and Nikola Jokic. And in a similar vein,
• 54:18
  Speaker 3: I feel like Jokic is not going to be out
• 54:20
  Speaker 3: here and saying, I need to get a star player
• 54:23
  Speaker 3: next to me. He said, as far as he's going
• 54:25
  Speaker 3: to say, it was in Serbia, we would all get fired.
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 54:30
  Speaker 3: Is KG also a comp for Jokic in the terms
• 54:32
  Speaker 3: of the way we look at this guy and when
• 54:34
  Speaker 3: he gets star players, then it changes the way we
• 54:37
  Speaker 3: view him and his legacy.
• 54:38
  Speaker 2: So it's interesting to me with KG because I think
• 54:40
  Speaker 2: for KG, it was not simply KG getting star guys.
• 54:45
  Speaker 2: It was also getting KG guys who could take those
• 54:48
  Speaker 2: shots that KG didn't really like to take. There's game
• 54:52
  Speaker 2: seven against Sacramento where he used to jump on my
• 54:55
  Speaker 2: back and he brought him home. This is a conference
• 54:56
  Speaker 2: semifinals in 2004, right? Like that is to me, the
• 54:59
  Speaker 2: defining individual Kevin Garnett game.
• 55:01
  Speaker 1: He made it happen. However, that is a dude, Tim Duncan,
• 55:06
  Speaker 1: by the way, also on this list, a little yippy.
• 55:09
  Speaker 2: When it came time for that big shot, that's not
• 55:11
  Speaker 2: really what they would like to do. The classic Tim
• 55:13
  Speaker 2: Duncan turnaround shot before the Derek Fisher shot in 04,
• 55:17
  Speaker 2: the one lucky shot deserves another.
• 55:18
  Speaker 1: As Shaq called it in that point. Duncan was aided
• 55:22
  Speaker 1: by having other people who could come do that. Come on, man.
• 55:24
  Speaker 3: Don't come for Duncan.
• 55:25
  Speaker 1: Don't do this. I'm not coming for Duncan.
• 55:27
  Speaker 2: I'm just saying you can still be Tim Duncan while also.
• 55:30
  Speaker 1: Like Karl Malone, a bit yippy. Charles Barkley. a big yippee.
• 55:36
  Speaker 2: Like you could go through and look at some of
• 55:37
  Speaker 2: these great players and would love to have somebody else
• 55:40
  Speaker 2: who could take that, who could be there to take
• 55:41
  Speaker 2: that shot. And then Kevin Garnett could be all encompassing
• 55:45
  Speaker 2: leader guy. It's still his team, but in a way
• 55:47
  Speaker 2: that does not require him to take that shot, right?
• 55:50
  Speaker 1: Jokic is not the same. in that regard. Jokic can
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: be that guy. He needs other players.
• 55:57
  Speaker 2: But I do think that Garnett needed a, like, you
• 56:00
  Speaker 2: couldn't give Garnett another glue type of guy because Kevin
• 56:02
  Speaker 2: Garnett is like the advanced version of Rasheed Wallace, a
• 56:05
  Speaker 2: super talented glue guy, right? With Jokic, I think my
• 56:09
  Speaker 2: question just is, you look at the Nuggets and Jamal Murray,
• 56:12
  Speaker 2: I think that, I think that Jamal Murray is Jamal
• 56:15
  Speaker 2: Murray as we think of Jamal Murray because he's played
• 56:17
  Speaker 2: with Nigel Jokic.
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: I think it's a fair point for us to make.
• 56:21
  Speaker 2: I don't even know who the guy is to put
• 56:23
  Speaker 2: around Jokic because I've seen what he's done and it's
• 56:26
  Speaker 2: been so excellent just with these dudes.
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: I can barely imagine if this is an extreme example.
• 56:31
  Speaker 2: What if Giannis somehow gets dropped off there?
• 56:34
  Speaker 1: I don't even know what to say.
• 56:38
  Speaker 3: What if it's Anthony Edwards, right? I mean, I'm not
• 56:40
  Speaker 3: saying that that's ever going to happen, but just the
• 56:42
  Speaker 3: guy who has that energy and also the off ball
• 56:44
  Speaker 3: and the size and he doesn't need to be the playmaker.
• 56:47
  Speaker 3: That's the one thing you can knock Anthony Edwards on
• 56:49
  Speaker 3: is that If you throw a double team at him,
• 56:51
  Speaker 3: he gets flustered in ways that he's just, he hasn't
• 56:55
  Speaker 3: developed the secondary playmaking that you would want at this
• 56:59
  Speaker 3: point in his career. But with Jokic, you don't have
• 57:01
  Speaker 3: to really worry about that as much. So I don't know.
• 57:04
  Speaker 3: And then like, it just aggravates me because it gets
• 57:07
  Speaker 3: bogged down in analytics when it's not, it's not, it's
• 57:11
  Speaker 3: not about analytics with Jokic to me. It gets, I
• 57:15
  Speaker 3: tweeted this out and people got all upset about it.
• 57:20
  Speaker 3: The Athletic tweeted that Jokic has never beaten a 50-win
• 57:24
  Speaker 3: team in the playoffs.
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: I saw that. The Clippers, by the way, won 49
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: in the short bubble season, I think. Why do we
• 57:31
  Speaker 1: do this?
• 57:34
  Speaker 3: It's intellectually dishonest if we're going to say Nikola Jokic,
• 57:38
  Speaker 3: when playing in two bubble years or COVID-shortened seasons, that
• 57:42
  Speaker 3: he hasn't won a 50-game, beaten a 50-win team. When
• 57:46
  Speaker 3: the Utah Jazz that year were a 50-win team, and
• 57:48
  Speaker 3: the Clippers that year were a 50-win team in 2020,
• 57:52
  Speaker 3: and they just had a COVID-shortened season. They had a
• 57:55
  Speaker 3: win percentage of a 50-win team and a 56-win team.
• 57:58
  Speaker 3: So it just seems like, to me, we want Jokic.
• 58:03
  Speaker 3: Because we've never seen anything like Jokic, there has to
• 58:06
  Speaker 3: be a reason why he's having shortcomings. And it's because
• 58:10
  Speaker 3: analytics overrated this guy. And I think it's more that
• 58:14
  Speaker 3: he hasn't had the complimentary supporting staff in ways that's
• 58:18
  Speaker 3: unprecedented in NBA history. And I think that should be
• 58:22
  Speaker 3: more of the conversation rather than analytics ruined the conversation.
• 58:29
  Speaker 3: Jokic is overrated through the analytics.
• 58:31
  Speaker 2: I also think it's just possible to say, Hey man,
• 58:33
  Speaker 2: dude had a bad series.
• 58:35
  Speaker 3: True.
• 58:36
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: It doesn't have to be much deeper than the guy
• 58:39
  Speaker 1: had a bad series, but that's not what we do. Right.
• 58:42
  Speaker 3: It's we take these things that happen in the playoffs
• 58:46
  Speaker 3: and we, we level it up into a larger conversation
• 58:49
  Speaker 3: about what this means for Jokic. And I'm not saying
• 58:51
  Speaker 3: we can't do that sometimes, but I just want to
• 58:53
  Speaker 3: make sure we're talking about it through the right lens.
• 58:55
  Speaker 3: And I just, I don't know. I feel like Jokic
• 58:58
  Speaker 3: is being represented as an analytics darling in ways that
• 59:02
  Speaker 3: it feels like basic stats. And if you just watch
• 59:04
  Speaker 3: this dude play basketball, why Stan Van Gundy says he
• 59:07
  Speaker 3: is the greatest offensive player he has ever seen. I
• 59:12
  Speaker 3: stay by Gunny is now you're saying he's a good
• 59:13
  Speaker 3: defender right he's saying he's the greatest offensive player he's
• 59:16
  Speaker 3: ever seen and the way that he passes and shoots
• 59:19
  Speaker 3: he had a bad series against Rudy Gobert he did
• 59:22
  Speaker 3: not post up and Rudy Gobert frightened him in ways
• 59:24
  Speaker 3: that I hadn't seen Jokic cower in that moment and
• 59:28
  Speaker 3: man I Just got to give Rudy Gobert his flowers.
• 59:33
  Speaker 3: At the end of the day, we're here in May
• 59:35
  Speaker 3: 6th as we're recording this. And at this point in
• 59:37
  Speaker 3: his career, Rudy Gobert is still changing the story of
• 59:41
  Speaker 3: his career.
• 59:42
  Speaker 2: Tom Haberstroh, check him out. Tom the Finder, check him
• 59:45
  Speaker 2: out at Yahoo Sports. Check him out with the Portland Trailblazers.
• 59:48
  Speaker 2: My brother, I appreciate you.
• 59:50
  Speaker 3: You got it, Bomani. Anytime, man.
• 59:51
  Speaker 1: All right, man. Ladies and gentlemen. Check us out.
• 59:54
  Speaker 2: BomaniJonesLive.com. Doing a live show in Atlanta. I said the
• 59:58
  Speaker 2: other day that it was May 13th. It's May 15th.
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 2: It's on Friday. BomaniJonesLive.com. Get your tickets there.
• 1:00:04
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• 1:00:05
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• 1:00:06
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